Retired fighter pilot vividly recalls combat missions in Vietnam

The first time Jim Cash took the controls of a jet as a teenager, he knew he was right where he was meant to be. Now in his 80s, the retired Air Force Brigadier General and Bigfork resident flew combat missions in Vietnam in an F-4 Phantom in the 1960s, was among the first pilots to fly the F-15 Eagle in the 1970s and later flew the F-16 Falcon as a wing commander at Florida’s MacDill Air Force Base before retiring as the vice commander of the 7th Air Force in South Korea in 1991.